Interesting take! I think what I’ve come to find, particularly after reading your post, that effective teaching comes with both experience and a sense of power (in a good way) and control in the classroom. However, as women we may have to try to make ourselves feel more “powerful.” What you mentioned about voice tone is interesting, and something I’ve thought about before. When I’m conversing with someone I tend to use a higher register because I’m trying to be polite and perhaps even a bit submissive – recently, I’ve wanted to work on changing my tone to convey more confidence. I want to come off as the in-control teacher, not the apologetic graduate student. Why do we have to think about these things that seem to come so naturally to men? It truly is better to accept and grow into your own teaching self – but, as we know, that is easier said than done.

Perhaps our teaching styles will have to differ from class to class, say from a group of 12 to a group of 180. Take for example the TED talk we watched where the professor said he took each one of his students out to lunch…while that is a nice idea, it’s not exactly realistic for everyone. Like you said, it’s difficult to even remember the names of 180+ people. It’s a bit unfortunate for these large groups, mentioning that something will be on the exam can be the only thing that perks their ears. But, I am guilty of this too.

Sarah Deel’s article resonated with me in the same way. The most effective teachers to me growing up were the ones who were funny, who joked around and were generally “buddy buddy” with the students. However, now that I think about it, most of those jokesters were male. However, I still wanted to be that fun, relatable teacher since that was what appealed to me. However, Sarah Deel made a good point regarding professionalism. If you do end up developing friendly relationships with your students, do you lose their respect or a place of authority? I think just like with anything, developing your own teaching style takes practice, not necessarily emulation.

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You’re right, education shouldn’t be monochromatic. I think that’s why it’s important that not every teacher teaches in EXACTLY the same way. There is no one perfect way, and we all benefit from being exposed to a variety of teaching styles and voices. Forcing ourselves to teach in someone else’s style comes across as fake and disingenuous, so it’s not worth doing anyway.

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You raised a fascinating point that our perception of a good teacher stems from our experience, but there is no guarantee that these experiences are sufficient to be a good teacher. I think there are several ways to become a good teacher, we need to learn from experience and re-evaluate our performance in this continuous process.

Thanks for the post. I agree: there’s no point in wasting energy trying to be someone you’re not. And from the list of your strategies, it seems to me like you’ll be a great teacher. I like some of your ideas, like playing music before class starts (I used to do this for an early morning recitation class for a calculus course, and it always got me pumped for the class… though I have no idea how the students felt about it!). Field trips are also awesome, good idea. Good luck!

Yes, I have heard the same thing: teaching experience doesn’t matter at the university level, though (like you) I disagree with that idea. It shouldn’t be assumed that teaching will just naturally come because you’re a great researcher… teaching takes a lot of practice and a lot of preparation. It would be nice if there were adequate support for university professors wanting to learn how to teach better (and adequate recognition of those efforts).

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I enjoyed reading your post. The first TA l had was not enrolled in my program or anything relating to my field. Needless to say it was not a good experience. The class had maybe 25 people and I was shocked on the last day that she still did not know our names. Granted, she may have been a TA for other classes and larger ones, but it surprised me that she didn’t even try by printing out the class roster. Throughout the whole semester she seemed disengaged and would only be present for the first 20-30 minutes of class. It was hard to trust her grading when I felt like she did not have a clue as to what was going on in the class.

Thank you for sharing your approach. I think that being passionate is authentic, but I can see where others may interpret your passion as an attack. One of my favorite messages that I have learned this semester is that there is a difference between offending and degrading. As long as you are being authentic in a way that is respectful then I do not see a problem.

I thought your word choice was interesting. Do you believe that “relateable” attempts to dismantle a hierarchy structure and do you think students see past the power difference?